THE SEA EMPRESS

OIL SPILL POST 75

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Technology of oil spill clean-up
How these apply in the Sea Empress case. note February
1996

The Torrey Canyon wreck showed the immense POSTnotes are intended to give Members an overview
of issues arising from science and technology. Members
problems of dealing with a large oil spill. Almost 30 can obtain further details from the PARLIAMENTARY
years later the spillage of North Sea crude from the OFFICE OF SCIENCE AND TECHNOLOGY (extension 2840).

Sea Empress off Milford Haven illuminates again

Table 1 TEN LARGEST SPILLS AND SOME RECENT SPILLS
the limits on our ability to mitigate the effects of
massive oil spills - despite much research, devel- Date Vessel Involved Location Amount Spilled
(‘000 tonnes)
opment and contingency planning since 1967. 1979 Atlantic Empress Off Tobago 280
1991 ABT Off Angola 260
This note reviews oil spill clean-up technology, 1983 Castillo De Bellver South Africa 257
its limitations and issues raised. 1978 Amoco Cadiz France 227
1991 Haven Italy 140
1988 Odyssey Off Canada 132
OIL SPILLS WORLDWIDE 1967 Torrey Canyon England 119
1972 Sea Star Gulf of Oman 125
Large oil spills are a familiar but highly variable occur- 1976 Urquiola Spain 108
1977 Hawaian Patriot North Pacific 99
rence - the worst year recorded by the International 1992 Aegean Sea Spain 72
Tanker Owners Pollution Federation (ITOPF) was 1979, 1989 Exxon Valdez Alaska 37
when 615,000 tonnes (tes) were spilt worldwide. In 1992 Braer Shetland 85
1996 Sea Empress Milford Haven 70+
contrast, last year (1995) only 5,000 tes were spilt. The
ten largest spills from ships around the world are listed Figure 1 SENSITIVE AREAS AROUND MILFORD HAVEN
in Table 1, together with other recent substantial spills.
In terms of size, the Sea Empress spill is between that of
the Exxon Valdez and Torrey Canyon.

The environmental impact is, however, determined

by much more than size - by the nature of the oil, the
rate of spillage, sea and weather conditions, the sensi-
tivity of the environment, location of beaches, ports
etc., and the marine life in the region. As shown in the
case of the Braer, given the right combination of high
winds and waves in open and deep waters, large
amounts of light oil can be rapidly removed by natural
processes, limiting environmental damage. In the
Milford Haven area, however, there are many sensitive
areas from fisheries, marine environmental and wild-
life standpoints. As can be seen from Figure 1, inshore vised by the MPCU as required. In large pollution
shellfish and amenity areas within the Haven are par- incidents such as the Braer and Sea Empress, the MPCU
ticularly at risk, as well as the islands of Skomer and sets up a Joint Response Centre which coordinates an
Skokholm with their bird and sea mammal colonies. integrated at-sea and on-shore clean-up operation.

UK POLICY ON SPILL RESPONSE UK policy relies on dispersants as the first line of

There are many possible technical responses to an oil
spill situation, as described in the Box (page 2). Each
method (dispersants, mechanical recovery etc.) has its
own advantages, disadvantages and limitations, and
the best approach needs to be assessed in the light of
individual circumstances; in some cases it may even be
least damaging to do nothing.
UK response to oil spills is organised by the Marine
Pollution Control Unit (MPCU) of the Department of
Transport (DoT). Oil that reaches shore is primarily the
responsibility of the local authority, who will be ad-
response, with mechanical recovery where it is practi-
cable (in view of the typical sea states in UK waters, off-
shore mechanical recovery is difficult). Experience in
the past showed that to be effective, dispersants have to
be applied when the oil is still fresh and before loss of
volatile components and weathering makes it immune
to dispersant and futile to spray. The realisation that
spraying could rapidly become ineffective led to a
move away from vessel spraying in the 1980s to aerial
application to provide the necessary swiftness of re-
sponse, and MPCU currently has 6 converted DC-3
aircraft under contract for applying dispersants, with
light aircraft to direct the spraying effort to the oil.
 P. O. S. T. Note 75
❒ TECHNICAL OPTIONS FOR CLEAN-UP
There is a whole spectrum of possible responses to an oil spill
situation (including leaving it alone).
Oil Off-loading
The best environmental option is clearly to offload the oil
before it can pollute the sea and foreshore. In calm waters,
this can be a straightforward operation if smaller tankers can
be brought alongside. Where seas are too rough or the tanker
cannot be approached, safety considerations may rule against
off-loading at sea. If aground on rocks near land, a land-
based operation could be considered. This would require
floating pipelines and pumping to temporary storage tanks
(e.g. pillow tanks) or into road tankers. The main difficulty
would be to assemble sufficient receiving capacity.
Recovery of Spilt Oil
Over the last 20 years, many mechanical oil recovery
devices have been developed (e.g. suction and weir skim-
mers, skimmers with a moving belt, oil-absorbent rope, mop
or discs). These cannot recover useful amounts of oil from
the thin layers once the oil has spread, and generally have to
work in conjunction with a boom, or in waters where relatively
thick layers of oil have accumulated through wind or wave
action. Booms tend to be ineffective in currents much over 1
to 1.5 knots and wave heights over 6 to 9 feet. Successful oil
recovery has thus tended to be limited to small spills in
sheltered waters, harbours, etc. Experience of large tanker
spills in open seas is that little oil can be recovered - in the
case of the Exxon Valdez, 6-8% was recovered at sea, even
in waters which were relatively sheltered and calm.
Some specially designed oil spill recovery vessels capa-
ble of collecting oil from the open ocean have been devel-
oped mainly by Dutch and German companies; one design
has a hinged split hull which opens and acts as two collecting
arms, funnelling the oil into the vessel. These systems have
the advantage of being complete, with significant on-board
oil/water separation capability and storage capacity. Their
disadvantages include their high cost and the time likely to be
required to steam to the site of a spill. Experience in clearing
up the Exxon Valdez spill emphasised the value of dual
purpose vessels, where local vessels such as dredgers could
be adapted for recovery purposes, and their storage capacity
used for oil. The DTI’s former Warren Spring Laboratory
(WSL)1 developed an oil recovery device known as
Springsweep which can be fitted to vessels to enable them
to recover oil in a moderate sea; it consists of a boom which
sweeps and concentrates oil into a skimmer head.
Dispersion
The Torrey Canyon was the first occasion on which
dispersants were used on a large scale in UK waters. Since
then, their use has remained controversial, although they
have remained the main plank of UK response. Dispersants
act by reducing the cohesiveness of the slick so that the oil
can be broken into small droplets by wind, wave and current
action. The dispersant stabilises the droplets so that they
remain in suspension and disperse with currents and tides,
breaking down more swiftly through microbial action.
Much of the controversy arose from the Torrey Canyon
experience that many of the worst ecological effects were
caused by indiscriminate use of early types of toxic disper-
sants. Since 1974, all dispersants have been licensed by
MAFF (currently under the Food and Environment Protection
Act (1985)) to ensure effectiveness and low toxicity to marine
life2. Because of the different technical requirements, prod-
ucts must be approved separately for use at sea, on sand and
gravel beaches, and on rocky foreshores.
Removal of oil from the surface reduces the threat to sea
birds and mammals and the shore. On the other hand,
dispersant use causes the concentrations of oil in the water
February 1996
column to increase. MAFF scientists conclude that under
most conditions at sea, little if any ecological damage is likely
to result from dispersant use. Inshore, a balance may have
to be struck between the wish to reduce the impact on birds
and mammals and the amount reaching the shore, and the
threat to mussels, fish farms etc., through toxicity or tainting
from oil in the water column. UK practice is for MPCU to
consult with fisheries departments and appropriate conserv-
ancy bodies on dispersant use in sensitive areas, within one
mile off shore, or in waters less than 20 metres deep.
Other Techniques at Sea
Burning can remove a high proportion of the oil; however,
in order to ignite oil on water the oil must be relatively fresh,
and the slick must be at least 3mm thick. Various ignition
systems are available including floating igniters that can be
deployed by air (e.g. helicopter). Arguments against burning
are that the volatile components are swiftly lost anyway
through evaporation, the difficulty of combining burning with
other approaches, including salvage, and the tendency for
the residues to sink to the seabed.
Other miscellaneous agents include gelling agents, herd-
ing agents and sinking agents, but these are not widely used.
Shore Protection and Clean-up
Booms can also used to protect sensitive areas such as
estuaries and coastlines, as well as to contain oil (e.g. around
a leaking vessel) to enable oil recovery. The restrictions on
current and wave height already mentioned apply. Once the
shore is soiled however, the choice is between attempting to
clean up the mess or, in sensitive environments such as salt
marshes, leaving it to natural processes.
Removal. Once the oil is stranded, a variety of techniques
can be used to remove the oil - from manual mopping up with
rags, mops, etc., through to bulldozers to remove oiled sand
to dispose of it elsewhere. The more drastic mechanical
recovery techniques such as beach removal, steam and
water jet cleaning can have more serious impacts on surviv-
ing intertidal flora and fauna than simple manual recovery, or
no action at all.
The use of dispersants on beaches and shorelines is
contentious, since the concentrations of oil and dispersant
can be very high due to the limited water available for dilution
in the intertidal zone. The case for dispersant use needs to
balance the interests at stake. In some situations (e.g.
amenity beaches) the economic case for clean-up may be
strong; in others, such as remote rocky foreshores, cleaning
may be left to natural degradative processes - in exposed
coasts and with light oils, this may take weeks to months; with
heavier oils in sheltered coves, up to several years.
Natural Degradation. Oil degrades naturally because
there are bacteria in the environment that can use the oil as
a food supply. The rate at which the bacteria can grow is,
however, often limited by the nutrients available. Research-
ers have tried to either develop ‘fertiliser’ mixtures to increase
the speed at which natural bacteria degrade the oil, or to
develop proprietary mixtures of oil-eating bacteria and ferti-
liser to spray on the oil. The Valdez spill gave US scientists
an opportunity to evaluate these approaches (bio-
remediation), and they concluded that applying a liquid oil-
miscible fertiliser caused the natural bacteria to grow faster,
and made substantial differences to the rate of natural clean-
up. The general effectiveness of such approaches remain
uncertain however, and bioremediation does not form part of
the UK's response 'tool-kit'.
1. Now closed, but its oil pollution and related expertise was transferred to the
National Environmental Technology Centre at Culham.
2. MAFF initiated a review in 1993 of the testing, approval and use of oil
dispersants, which has just been published (Jan 1996).
 P. O. S. T. Note 75
The MPCU also has dispersant-spraying equipment
fitted to a number of commercial tugs at strategic
positions around the coast, a small amount of mechani-
cal recovery equipment (including two Springsweep
sets - see Box) for use on chartered vessels, equipment
for lightering operations and for beach-cleaning.
Because the MPCU has only a small permanent staff, it
has agreements with the oil industry to respond to
emergencies. A Memorandum of Understanding has
been under negotiation with the United Kingdom Off-
shore Oil Operators Association (UKOOA), and the UK
Petroleum Industries Association (UKPIA) since the
Braer incident, whereby the industry supplies staff to
help manage the clean-up operation. It is expected to
be signed soon. Response is generally according to the
system of three tiers. Tier One (T1) deploys the equip-
ment used for local operational spills at the port itself;
T2 pulls together equipment available at centres within
the immediate area; T3 is where the national resources
are mobilised - including stocks at the oil industry’s
(international) base at Southampton (Oil Spill Response
Ltd - OSR), with equipment listed in Table 2.
The UK can also ask for assistance from neighbouring
countries under the Bonn Agreement (for Cooperation
in Dealing with Pollution of the North Sea by Oil); there
are also bilateral agreements with France (Mancheplan)
and Norway (the NorBrit plan).
THE SEA EMPRESS EXPERIENCE
The major problem encountered initially with the Sea
Empress was the failure to offload the oil from the
vessel until it had been badly damaged and lost over
half its cargo. Offloading to tankers was thwarted by
the heavy weather and the inability of the tugs available
to prevent the Sea Empress from repeated grounding.
The tanker was removed from the rocks and berthed to
allow off-loading the remaining oil on February 21/22,
but not before 70,000 tes had been spilt.
The oil was Forties (North Sea) crude, which is com-
paratively light and therefore contains a substantial
proportion of volatile components. This is amenable to
dispersant spraying provided it can be attacked within
several hours, after which 'mousse' (water in oil emul-
sion) can be formed, rendering it less amenable to
dispersion. In view of the richness of the local marine
life (including seabirds, mammals, marine fisheries),
MAFF withheld approval for the use of dispersants
within Milford Haven, in a coastal strip 1 nautical mile
from the shore and within 1 nm of Skomer. The
MPCU's 6 aircraft (joined by OSR's C-130) were able to
spray1 the bulk of the slick as it moved into the outer
Bristol Channel, and report success (combined with the
generally active sea conditions) in dispersing much of
1. Four dispersant concentrates are being used: Dasic Slickgone NS and
LTSW, and Finasol OSR 51 and 52. These are all licensed by MAFF. In
addition, a small amount of demulsifier has been used on oil mousse.
February 1996
Table 2 EQUIPMENT HELD BY THE OIL SPILL RESPONSE LTD.
Containment Booms (Offshore) 6 kms
Containment Booms (Inshore) 11 kms
Skimmers and transfer pumps Around 100
Temporary oil storage facilities Around 50 tanks:
total 600 tonnes
Dispersant equipment
Offshore spray units 7 (3 aerial, 4 offshore)
Inshore spray units 20
Beach clean-up units 40
Planes (for transport and spraying) 1
the oil in open water. After the vessel was moved inside
the Haven on 23 Feb, spraying was discontinued be-
cause there was no oil outside the Haven amenable to
dispersion. By this time, some 440 tes had been sprayed
- perhaps dispersing 4-8,000 tes of oil. With evapora-
tion removing perhaps 30-40% of the oil, many thou-
sand tonnes of weathered oil and mousse remain to
contaminate seabirds and shores. Remnants in the form
of sheens and weathered oil/mousse are widespread,
affecting waters and shores from North Devon to north
of Skomer, and as far as Porthcawl into the Bristol
Channel. Oil is also affecting the islands of Skomer,
Skokholm and Lundy.
As shown in Figure 1, the main resources at risk are:
Marine birds and waders. Bird counts by the RSPB,
Countryside Council for Wales (CCW) and other groups
revealed 12-13,000 birds in the Haven estuary on 13
February. Outside the Haven, guillemots are returning
2-3 weeks early to their colonies of which Skomer, Stack
Rocks and Ramsey Island are the largest. There are also
over 60,000 gannets and 10,000 seaducks (scoters) in the
adjoining bays and sea areas. Manx shearwaters have
yet to return and are still generally beyond the range of
the oil. Birds in the area are very vulnerable to the many
patches of oil remaining, to oil which has come ashore,
and to oil within the Haven. So far (Feb 27), over 1,200
oiled birds are in treatment and some 400 bodies have
been picked up (some experts consider these are likely
to represent only 10% of the total number so affected).
In addition, some 5,000 of the birds still flying have
been seen to be oiled to some degree. The final impact
on the bird population will thus be substantial. Scoters
have been particularly badly hit, and deaths have
included rare species such as divers and grebes.
Sea mammals. The Dyfed coast is home to 4% of the UK
grey seal population. Adults are not so susceptible to
oil as birds, although they can be poisoned by the
components in fresh oil, and 45 seals have been seen
oiled to some degree. The pupping season is from
August, so the more vulnerable pups will not be present.
Dolphins have also been reported in areas of slicks.
Fisheries. The main commercial resources at risk out-
side the Haven are coastal crab and lobster fisheries and
offshore finfisheries - both from the reality and percep-
tion of contamination. Most vulnerable are the Haven's
shellfisheries (mainly mussels) which may be tainted
 P. O. S. T. Note 75
even when not killed; fish farms adjoin the Haven, and
there are seabed environments of conservation value.
Oil has spread some 10km up the estuary. Fishermen
have applied a voluntary ban on sales from the area.
Coastline and Foreshore. The whole area is one of
National Park and Heritage Coast, with over 30 SSSIs,
2 of the UK's 3 marine nature reserves (Skomer, Lundy),
and sites of European conservation importance. Mor-
tality of intertidal fauna has been 100% near the main
spill and oil has also spread over wide areas of coast to
the north and south of the Haven entrance; additional
contamination is likely with onshore winds. Potentially
sensitive estuaries have been boomed by the NRA, but
the foreshore cannot be so protected.
The next stage will be to monitor the effects of the 70,000
tonnes spilt on the marine environment. A number of
environmental impact assessments will shortly be
underway. For instance, MAFF has sent its Research
Vessel (Corystes) to measure the extent of contamina-
tion of the water, fish, shellfish and sediments, and the
condition of marine life in general following the spill.
The Welsh Office will be funding a £250,000 investiga-
tion of environmental impact by CCW. There is a good
database of the pre-spill state (particularly for Skomer)
which will allow longer term effects to be judged.
LESSONS FOR UK RESPONSE POLICY
The Royal Commission on Environmental Pollution
noted in 1981 the contrast between the limitations of
clean-up technology and the optimistic tone of much
official thinking. The Sea Empress reinforces lessons
from other large spills - that booms, spraying, etc., offer
at best only limited protection against environmental
damage; indeed the extent of damage can depend as
much on the weather as human intervention. Despite
the large amount of research worldwide over the last
20-30 years2, the most effective form of environmental
protection remains to minimise the spills occurring.
It is too early to draw firm lessons from the Sea Empress
experience, but observers draw attention to a number
of relevant factors beyond those (e.g. tug availability)
directly involved in the vessel's salvage. One technical
option for lightering offered by a Norwegian ship-
owner which was not pursued, was for a dynamic
positioning tanker which could remain stationary (with-
out the need to anchor) while off-loading up to a mile
away from the grounded vessel. Had the Sea Empress
remained fast on the rocks, it might have been techni-
cally feasible to take advantage of the tanker's proxim-
ity to land to offload oil into temporary storage tanks or
to road tankers.
2. DoT's research budget is ca £1M p.a. and has supported a number of
projects; e.g.aerial remote sensing of oil thickness,emulsion formation
and dispersion, cleanup of salt marshes and mudflats, effectiveness of
demulsifiers, review of sorbents and burning of slicks.
February 1996
As far as the spill response is concerned, even though
conditions were favourable for aerial spraying-assisted
dispersion, substantial amounts of mousse and weath-
ered oil remain; quantities in the Haven itself are being
removed by local oil recovery craft and by additional
(including French) vessels. As already mentioned, of
particular concern is the amount of oil reaching the
breeding islands, and the impact on estuarine and
coastal shellfish, crab/ lobster fisheries, where con-
tamination is a potential long term problem.
The Sea Empress also illustrates the potential difficul-
ties of organising the clean-up with so many interested
parties involved. As far as the vessel itself is concerned,
as soon as the salvage contract is let, all actions related
to that vessel become the responsibility of the salvor.
On the spill response, while MPCU maintains a lead
role, its main equipment is the spraying aircraft, and it
relies very much on the oil industry for additional
equipment needed for containment, physical recovery,
shore clean-up and supplementary aerial spraying.
While much of this (Tier-1 and Tier-2) equipment may
be deployed swiftly, access to T-3 (e.g. OSR) required
Texaco (the owner of the cargo) to decide unilaterally to
commit these resources. Subsequent attempts to share
the responsibility with others (e.g. insurers) can divert
attention from the needs of clean-up, or in the event of
a failure to agree, lead to premature reduction in effort.
The current policy emphasis on relying on the oil
industry to conduct the clean-up is consistent with the
polluter pays principle, but some remain concerned
that the necessity of debate between all the different
parties involved and their insurers can make swift
action more difficult to achieve than where a central
organisation (e.g. MPCU) acts first and recovers costs
later. In either case, there are well-established compen-
sation schemes for recovering clean-up costs under the
International Oil Pollution Compensation Fund, whose
limits are to be increased in May 1996.
As already mentioned, bodies from County Councils,
the Port Authority, MAFF, NRA, and conservation and
wildlife organisations are involved in consultations on
spill response. Conflicts can arise between environ-
mental and operational interests - e.g. the salvage
interest was to move the leaking tanker into the relative
safety of the Haven; from an environmental and
shellfisheries point of view this was a worse option
because it introduced more oil into a particularly sensi-
tive and constrained environment - better could have
been offloading in more open areas where spillages
could have been dispersed into open water. It remains
MPCU's role to attempt to resolve such conflicts, and to
make decisions where consensus cannot be reached;
however, the salvor remains the prime decision-maker
on the fate of the vessel once the salvage contract has
been let.
Copyright POST, 1996